I Know She Sees Me
by Brighteyes of Thunderclan
Summary: Have you ever wanted something, and then decided you no longer needed it? Have you ever needed something, but never wanted it? I've loved and lost, but I never realized what I wanted was not what I needed, until it was too late. Now a part of me lies at the bottom of that river.


I know she sees me, yet I'm still invisible. I'm always there, but I can never be by her side. It pains me, watching her, knowing things will never be as they once were. We never had a normal, anyway. Then why does it bother me?

I watched her as a kit, large and clumsy, always whimpering about something or another. Beside her sister, she was merely a tangle of white, a jumble of stubby legs and thick fur, always tripping over herself. The only things that would distinguish her from a pile of snow were her eyes, like golden suns. She was loud, obnoxious, an attention seeker. I supposed it was her mother's doing, but I hated her from the moment she came wailing into this world. But her sister, oh, Swanmist was beautiful even as a kit. There was no mistaking her for snow, dirty or clean. Soft, sleek white and silver fur, like moonlight on a frosted pond, and someone had taken the liberty to swirl both together with a tasteful paw. Her eyes glowed pale green, like Newleaf grass, and her smile was bright as the sun, and just as warm. She was small and delicate as a woodland fairy, and all the more beautiful. I had resented Whitefang for harboring Swanmist's attention. We teased her and prodded her, and made her life a living Hell, which I deeply regret now. If I had the power to go back in time and change, I would. I would change many things.

As apprentices we weren't much better. Older but no wiser, we tormented her mercilessly. Rainwing, Bouncestrike, and I were the bane of her existence. Teasing, prodding, our tongues were as sharp as our claws and all the more dangerous. Swanmist was always there for her, until it all became too much. I had done my job, and torn them apart. Whitefang had only Barkpaw and the kits, while I had gained myself Swanmist. I was terribly proud of it. We promised each other we'd be mates forever, together for eternity. Barkpaw loved Swanmist dearly, and I hated him for it. He, too, would grow to be the victim of my rage. Bouncestrike, he wanted nothing more to do with this mistreatment. He found himself drifting further and further away…Rainwing and I stayed the same monsters we were. I would change many things.

We became warriors, my siblings and I, and found ourselves too good to be wrapped up in the lives of little apprentices, though I still wanted Swanmist as my own. I made no grand show of it; it was frowned upon by the elder warriors, and their respect was earned, not freely given. I had to claw my way up in the world. Barkpaw made to speak with Swanmist one day, and he upset her, which set my blood boiling. I rounded on him in the middle of the night; a coward, attacking an apprentice as he slept, but I did it nonetheless. When he ran away, Swanmist was torn apart by her sister's misery, yet I felt no remorse. It pleased me to no end that the bothersome brat had gone, but when Darkclaw rounded on me, I did feel the slightest twinge of remorse. Now, I would change many things.

Swanmist and Whitefang became warriors, and Swanmist and I immediately began to share a nest. Her name was beautiful, and yet Whitefang's intrigued me. Why her, that gnarled, matted white mess, why should her name be after a legend? Was she a legend as well? A martyr, a hero? Was she a rough river stone, tumbled from the mountains and washed clean, worn down to her true core? I pushed those thoughts away and focused on my mate. She never told me she was expecting. How could I have known? She hid it well from me, and the rest of them, yet confided in her sister with all her heart. The loss of my kits was hard; but no so hard for me as it was for her. She'd held them in her belly, and I'd been oblivious. how could I care so much about the kits I'd never known existed? When they came home, covered in blood and snow, my heart pounded violently in my chest as though it were planning to break free. Something was wrong. They collapsed in the clearing, and I only had eyes for them. At the time, with my thoughts jumbled, my mind in a whirl, I thought I was watching out for Swanmist. I know better now. Whenever my gaze strayed, it would land on her nest. She would moan and twitch in her sleep, crying out softly, and my heart had ached to comfort her. Before she passed out from shock, I'd apologized. I hadn't known what'd come over me, but now it's clear. The shock of losing them…of losing her was too much. I had thought it was _Whitefang's_ blood. Swanmist did not stir in her dreams. I wondered how many poppy seeds she'd taken.

As moons went on, I'd watched her. She grew in my eyes. Swanmist was still my precious darling; both she and the Clan were wrapped around my paw, but _her_ I couldn't break. I never had been able to. We were apprenticed a pair of siblings, and that very moon I lost Swanmist. We'd been trying for kits; she'd desired them. I found thatI didn't much care; kits or no kits, I had my mate and my apprentice. What more could I want? What joy could a few bothersome bundles bring me? I now know they would've kept me going, because when she died, I died, too. Maybe my feelings weren't as strong as whatever I felt for Whitefang, but they weren't invisible. Swanmist's death still hit me like a hurricane, tearing through my heart.

Training with Whitefang was like a ray of sunshine. She was beautiful, witty, charming when she wanted to be. Hell, she was even charming when she cursed. She never could like me, not even a quarter.

I fell for her as the leaves began to change; her eyes glowed with the reds and oranges of the foliage and her gaze burned like fire. It was then, standing under those trees as the falling flames swirled about us, that I realized I loved her. Every day after that, I would yearn for her touch, her voice, the little thump thump thump of her footfalls next to mine. It was incessant, the watching and waiting and hoping that she felt the same. For such a proud warrior, I couldn't gather the courage to tell her. Until it was too late.

We made a truce. It was broken. My sister told me we bickered like a couple in the elder's den, and I could picture it. We would lie there in the dark, her grumbling, and I would grumble back. Her eyes would light up, and she'd be animated whenever we spoke. I would watch her, and know that she was mine. We'd be old, yes, saggy, yes, and ragged, of course. But our kits would visit. A handsome white pelted tom with my eyes and her smile, a white and brown tabby she-cat, and maybe a brown tabby tom. I'd want three. If we had four, I'd like to think she would have been white pelted, too: a medicine cat. We could've named her Swankit. I'd think Snowkit for the tom, maybe Snowblaze as a warrior. And for the white and brown she-cat: Shykit. Then Shystep. The brown tabby would've been Barkkit, then Barkclaw, and his sister would've been Swanpath. They'd all be beautiful. The grandkits would visit, too, all of them. I had always thought there'd be at least seven, maybe eight or nine. We could've told stories to all of them: wild adventures, mystical fables, and those of our own lives. We would die side by side, curled around each other, like they do in fairytales. In Starclan, we'd be happy forever. We'd watch our family grow. We'd greet our kits when their time came, and then the grandkits, the great-grandkits, and so on. Surrounded by love, we'd be the center of it all. She'd be my fantasy, my happy ending, my ever after.

It didn't happen that way. I watched her fall for someone else. It was gradual, then all at once. At first I thought it was Appleclaw. Then Lightheart. Finally, they revealed themselves. Not by choice, of course, I had to be the one to throw him to the ground. She had to be the hero. Snowflakes fell and froze her heart as cold and unyielding as the ice over the lake. Every time we spoke, she wore a mask of indifference; her features seemed carved from stone, and every word we exchanged echoed like rocks tossed at frozen mountains. Even come spring, when the warm winds blew up from the south and the snow melted away, she ignored me. She drifted away, further and further…I fought harder than ever, even traveling to twolegplace to win her heart, but by then she was already pregnant. How I wished they were mine! Of all the things I could've done…could've changed…I would do it all over again if it meant we were together. Then, the sun shone bright in the Greenleaf sky and she needed me. I would play dummy, the fake father, a cover-up, a phony. If this meant I was part of her life, so be it.

She and Falconshade fought like badgers, then the kits were born. Over and over, time and time again, she'd have the same dream. If only I knew what it meant, what it did to her, I could've done something. Saved her from the guilt that drowned her in sorrow. Maybe then I wouldn't have found her at the bottom of that river.

She'd loved those kits. I, who had never desired offspring, found myself wishing they were mine and spending every second of every waking moment with them. I wanted to be the father they'd remember, not just a stand-in scarecrow who'd be pushed aside once Falconshade arrived. I loved them, but nothing was as fierce as a mother's love. Well, grief is just as strong, I guess. That's what tore her from them; she couldn't take it anymore. Some said it was the coward's way out, but I disagree. She thought those three angels would be better off without her, and she was trying to make things right. I knew she didn't want to go. You could see it in her eyes, those dead golden orbs that no longer sparkled with life and light. They stared at me when I found her, unblinking. They were afraid. They wanted an escape, but not like this. Never like this. Blossomkit, Hazelkit, and Wolfkit never understood why their mother wouldn't stand up. Why she wouldn't speak or move, or acknowledge their presence. They waited by her sopping wet body all night for some sign that she _wasn't_ dead. Cherrynose waited with them. I was all they had left, but in a week or so, after the gathering, they were taken from me. Falconshade came to claim them, and I fought hard against him. He couldn't take my children- his children- away from me. Stonetail held me back, and Paledove was wracked with sorrow at the loss of the only pieces of her daughter she had left. Too late, she'd made amends. Now the stars were getting back at her.

The kits were screaming, crying for me. They didn't know this stranger, this tom who claimed to be their true father. They knew _me_. I watched them leave from behind the gray legs of Stonetail: the bars of my new prison. I never heard from them again until he came home. Him, with his scarred and tattered ginger pelt, cut through with dark stripes. His deep blue eyes full of fear and pain. At his side were three pelts I could barely recognize anymore: they'd gotten so big. They hardly remembered me. He had come home because he knew it _was_ home; without Shimmerstar to vouch on their behalf they were thrown from the land by the river. Stonetail and Paledove emerged from the elder's den, dull eyes lit up with the return of the kits. They remembered them, but not me.

I was a shadow, a long lost piece of the puzzle that had been replaced. It didn't matter that I had raised them with her, or that I had been there when they lost her. No, I was not their father anymore. But finally, after a week of silence, one of them approached me.

"I remember you," The tom had said, blue eyes like his father's boring into my soul. But he spoke so much like his mother. His fur was white and matted and clumpy, like hers, and he stood, facing me the same way. Paws apart, legs locked. Dominant. But curious. "You're my other father." I nearly cried tears of joy when he said that; my heart burst open and I think I might have choked. He remembered me. I said his name, and his eyes widened.

"Timbermask," He said, and my name on his tongue was sweet as honey. I took him into a tight embrace, and his purr was loud as a thousand thunderclaps. As I sat with him, I could only imagine if she'd been here. If she hadn't run away. If she'd followed a different path.

Maybe then I wouldn't have found her at the bottom of that river.


End file.
